Pittsburgh Steelers Secondary Not To Blame In Super Bowl XLV Loss

I knew all of the cockroaches would make their way out of the woodwork at some point. The dominant topic on talk radio throughout the morning and into the afternoon is how terrible the secondary is. Knowing how my Steelers brethren react, this doesn't surprise me at all.

"Yinz gotta trust me on this. That Ike Taylor is terrible n'at."

"Yo, we need to trade up and draft a shutdahn corner n'at."

"Hey why are da Stillers not using dat press coverage n'at!? Dey always play like 10 yards off da ball!"

These are just some of the lines that have swarmed around on the radio and have made me think of strangling myself. It seems that after every loss, there are yinzers from all over Western Pa. that think they can make the perfect diagnosis for their beloved Steelers.

It just so happens that today, we are coming off of a heart-breaker. With all of the complaining about how bad the Pittsburgh secondary is, I've got to sound off.

First of all, I believe many of you need a refresher on how the Steelers defensive scheme actually works. Their objective, first and foremost, is to get to and/or confuse the quarterback. That's why we see a lot of movement and disguising pre-snap.

Secondly, they don't want to give up any big plays which is something they are the best in the NFL at doing. This is why we see them playing a lot of off-coverage and less press coverage. Dick Lebeau will give you a lot underneath, but as long as he can take everything over the top away and still have pass rushers get to the quarterback.

When the rush actually gets there, everyone thinks the coverage is great. When they don't we hear from the hungover idiots that we have heard from today.

Where were all of these people when they won Super Bowl XLIII two years ago? That's right, they were hiding their secret man crushes for people like Troy Polamalu, Ryan Clark, Bryant McFadden, William Gay, and Taylor. The same names that are being crucified right now.

Why do you think Tom Brady owns this team whenever he plays them? They know how to beat the Steelers scheme. They know that if they can run 45 passing plays with two or three step drops, that the pass rush is a non-factor and that there will be holes, excuse me, yawning crevices in the secondary.

It's never because McFadden and Gay are terrible corners, it's because of the way the Steelers run their scheme.

Mark my words, if Darrelle Revis and Champ Bailey in his prime were in this scheme, you would be saying they need to go as well.